business
Allen Becker, Who Built PACE Concerts Into a Live Promotion Powerhouse, Dies at 90
In the 1970s, Louis Messina visited the Houston Astrodome to check out the events his new business partner, Allen J. Becker, was putting on. “He’s doing boat shows and having Evel Knievel jump over 150 cars and thrill shows and demolition derbies,” Messina recalls. “I went, ‘Holy crap, there are 60,000 people here!’ A guy jumped from the top of the Astrodome into the air bag.” Becker, 90, who died Monday (Dec. 12) at his Houston home, first approached Messina, then a New Orleans rock promoter, in 1975 to form a concert-promotion partnership. Their company, PACE Concerts, went on to dominate Texas and much of the South for more than 20 years, booking stars from The Who to Bruce Springsteen to Rush. “Allen had an old saying: ‘I’d rather lose money with you than you make a dime without me’ — ...
SoundCloud Revenue Rose 19% in 2021 Thanks to Subscriber Growth, Creator Tools Adoption
SoundCloud Holdings GmbH and its subsidiaries reported revenue in 2021 of 230.7 million euros ($273 million at the average exchange rate in 2021 of 1.18308), up 19% from the prior year, according to audited financial statements published by the privately held company in Germany on Tuesday (Dec. 13). SoundCloud, which originally gained popularity for its embeddable streaming widget, has a unique business model that mixes tools for music creators and listening for fans. Fan revenue — from advertising and subscriptions — improved 16.6% to 143.3 million euros ($170 million), or 62.2% of total revenue, down from 63.5% in 2020. Revenue from subscribers grew 20% year over year and exceeded internal expectations, according to the financial statements. Advertising revenue was in line with exp...
Megan Thee Stallion Delivers Tearful Testimony During Day 2 of Tory Lanez Trial: ‘I Wish He Had Just Shot & Killed Me’
Megan Thee Stallion appeared in Los Angeles court Tuesday (Dec. 13) on the second day of the closely-watched trial over whether Tory Lanez shot her in the foot on July 12, 2020. The rapper was met with a legion of her supporters at the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center, several of whom held a big, black “WE STAND WITH MEGAN” banner during a rally that was organized by non-profit The Gathering of Justice in conjunction with multiple women’s and violence prevention organizations. The Grammy winner arrived at the courthouse wearing a blunt shoulder bob and bold purple suit — a fitting color choice that symbolizes awareness of domestic violence, especially against women. Once on the stand, Stallion’s voice cracked after L.A. County Deputy District Attorney Kathy Ta, one of the pro...
The Legal Beat: Taylor Swift Ends ‘Shake It Off’ Battle – Plus Megan Thee Stallion, Nick Carter & More
This is The Legal Beat, a weekly newsletter about music law from Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings, and all the fun stuff in between. This week: Taylor Swift ends a long-running copyright case over the lyrics to “Shake It Off,” Tory Lanez heads to trial over accusations that he shot Megan Thee Stallion, Backstreet Boys member Nick Carter is accused of sexually assault, and much more. THE BIG STORY: Taylor Swift’s Accusers Drop “Shake It Off” Case It was the next big music copyright case – until it wasn’t. After five long years of litigation, and with just a month to go until a scheduled trial, attorneys for Taylor Swift reached an agreement Monday with songwriters Sean Hall and Nathan Butler to end their copyright infringement lawsuit cl...
Concert Venues Are Still Closing After the Pandemic — My Local Club Just Shut Down
DENVER — Tennyson’s Tap was the kind of music club where, on packed nights, the lone frazzled employee serving drinks, running sound and manning the door might ask one of the bands to help out and collect the $5 cover charge. I know because I sang in one of those bands, Smaldone Faces, and our bassist Luke and I pretty much let everyone in for free. The Tap, at 4335 W. 38th St. in Denver, specialized in whiskey and scruffy musicians of every conceivable genre — my two bands that played there did country, punk and metal covers, and we opened for screamo indie-rockers, jazzy improvisationalists and dreadlocked funk-and-reggae combos. The bar smelled like cigarettes and beer, and had a capacity of about 90, but when we drew our crowds of 20 or 30 people, it roared like Springsteen at the Roxy...
Tory Lanez Allegedly Shot Megan Thee Stallion Because She ‘Insulted His Skills as a Musical Artist,’ Court Hears
Opening statements kicked off the highly anticipated trial over whether Tory Lanez shot Megan Thee Stallion in the foot two years ago. Los Angeles prosecutors hope to convict Lanez (real name Daystar Peterson) of three felony charges over the July 12, 2020 incident, in which he allegedly shot Stallion in the foot during an argument after a pool party in the Hollywood Hills. In October 2020, he was charged with one count of assault with a firearm and another gun possession charge. On Dec. 6, 2022, just one week before the trial began, the L.A. district attorney’s office added a new, third count of discharging a firearm with gross negligence. If convicted on all three charges, Lanez faces 22 years in prison. Yet Lanez, 30, has maintained his innocence and looked poised to fight for it while ...
Sean Warner to Lead Universal Music Australia
BRISBANE, Australia — Universal Music Australia taps Sean Warner for the top job, which will vacated by the incumbent George Ash at year’s end. Announced Tuesday (Dec. 13), Warner is promoted to president, Universal Music Australia & New Zealand, with effect from Jan. 1, 2023. The incoming chief is a UMA stalwart with 15 years’ experience leading the company’s commercial business, both physical and digital. Warner joined UMA in 2007 as national sales manager and has served on its senior management team in recent years, most recently as senior vice president of commercial, with duties for the commercial growth, innovation and digital development for UMA & New Zealand. During his time with Universal, Warner has overseen the commercial strategy in Southeast Asia (SEA), launched...
George Ash to Exit Universal Music Australia
BRISBANE, Australia — George Ash is stepping down as president of Universal Music Australia and New Zealand. In a surprise announcement that hit inboxes as the music industry settled in for the first day of the working week, Universal Music Group announced Ash would retire from his position at the end of the year. “The time is right for me to step down from Universal,” says the outgoing executive in a corporate statement. “I feel confident that with the brilliant leadership group we have now, the organization will continue to grow and thrive. New Zealand-born Ash will leave UMA as part of a “long-planned personal decision to focus on new goals and projects,” reads the statement, “whilst leaving the company under the leadership of a new generation of executives, who will continue to b...
How Bad Bunny Staged His Record-Setting Stadium Tour: 36 Trucks, a Cargo Jet & 100 Tons of Equipment
Few things faze Noah Assad, Bad Bunny’s manager. But even he admits that launching a stadium tour barely three months after an arena tour was a bit daunting. “We knew it was going to be a learning experience and something none of us had done before,” Assad says now, “but we went for it and worked through it with the help of old and new partners and set new industry standards.” Bad Bunny ends the year as the top touring act of 2022, grossing $373.5 million from 1.8 million tickets across 65 shows, according to Billboard Boxscore, and that number doesn’t even include his last 20 Latin American stadium shows. This makes Bunny — born Benito Martinez Ocasio — the first act who doesn’t perform in English to ever top the year-end tally. World’s Hottest Tour broke venue revenue records in 12 of th...
CZ and SBF duke it out on Twitter over failed FTX/Binance deal
Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, or CZ, and former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, or SBF, have revealed new details about the failed agreement between the exchanges during FTX’s liquidity crisis in November. In a Dec. 9 Twitter thread, CZ referred to Bankman-Fried as a “fraudster,” saying Binance exited its position in FTX in July 2021 after becoming “increasingly uncomfortable with Alameda/SBF.” According to the Binance CEO, SBF was “unhinged” at the exchange pulling out — a claim that prompted an online response from the former FTX CEO. Bankman-Fried criticized CZ for his public admonition of FTX, adding details about the negotiations between the exchanges amid FTX’s reported “liquidity crunch” in November prior to the firm filing for bankruptcy. SBF said at the time that FTX had reached a ...
Justin Bieber and The Weeknd Sued Over Alleged Bored Ape NFT Scheme: ‘Drastically Inflated Prices’
Justin Bieber, Snoop Dogg, The Weeknd and dozens of other celebrities are facing a new class action alleging they were secretly paid to “misleadingly” promote NFTs like the Bored Ape Yacht Club, leaving investors with “staggering losses.” In a complaint filed Thursday in Los Angeles federal court, attorneys for a pair of consumers claimed that Bored Ape parent company Yuga Labs Inc. perpetrated a “vast scheme” in which they “discreetly” paid “highly influential celebrities” to pump up the value of the NFTs (non-fungible tokens). “Defendants’ promotional campaign was wildly successful, generating billions of dollars in sales and re-sales,” the lawyers for the plaintiffs wrote. “The manufactured celebrity endorsements and misleading promotions … were able to artificially increase the interes...
K-Pop Promoter Behind BTS, BLACKPINK Tours Partners With AEG Presents
AEG Presents, a global leader in concert promotion and artist development, on Thursday (Dec. 8) announced an official strategic partnership with K-pop touring and marketing company Powerhouse. The two live music companies, which have worked together on many successful K-pop artists over the past 13 years, will collaborate on all aspects of the live K-pop business including touring, production, marketing and media across every level. “In the course of last two decades, K-pop has grown to be one of the most popular genres in the global music industry.,” says C.S. Hah, Powerhouse chief executive and president. “The K-pop market has proven its depth and width to be more matured than ever, and I hope our launch of this formal partnership with AEG Presents can help K-pop grow to reach new horizo...
